


The Puckering Plant

by jilliancares



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Christmas, Christmas Fluff, First Kiss, M/M, Mistletoe, and can't get out until they kiss, basically what i'm saying is they get trapped under a mistletoe, except not, obviously
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-15 18:06:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13036551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jilliancares/pseuds/jilliancares
Summary: Lance forces everyone to reel in their Christmas spirit by decorating with whatever items he can find that vaguely resemble Christmas decorations. This includes a not-mistletoe, something that he and Keith mysteriously find themselves stuck under.





	The Puckering Plant

**Author's Note:**

> me: i need to write a fic for my secret santa  
> also me: this needs to be posted Now
> 
> in other, unrelated news, i need to write a second fic Very Soon for my secret santa

Lance wasn’t one for losing sight of what truly mattered: Christmas spirit.

Too often he’d heard similar words uttered from Shiro’s mouth, but instead of “Christmas spirit” he usually said something along the lines of “the fate of the universe”. Of course, this wasn’t to say that the fate of the universe wasn’t important, nor that Lance didn’t care about it — he just knew it was important to care about other things as well. Such as Christmas. Which was _right around the corner_ , people!

Nobody else seemed to think this was as important as it so clearly was. And, Lance was pretty sure, no one else was even keeping track of the dates back on earth anymore. But that didn’t mean that Lance wasn’t. His phone still worked — sure, not a single text message would ever go through (he’d tried only about a million times), but somehow the calendar app still worked, and it was already December.

The first time he’d mentioned Christmas he’d just gotten a load of blank stares. Keith had raised an eyebrow, looking at him like he was an idiot, and Hunk had just looked kind of sad for him. Pidge hadn’t seemed to care that Christmas was fast approaching without any plans accompanying it, and Shiro seemed to think that there was no time for them to take a break to celebrate Christmas anyway, which, _what_? That was just fucking crazy!

Thankfully, Allura, for some reason, had taken his side.

“I think it’s important that we honor earth traditions,” she’d said, nodding and looking around importantly. Lance had been bouncing on his toes at this point, knowing he was going to end up getting his way with the _princess_  on his side. “Plus, this seems to be really important to Lance…”

“It is!” Lance had hastily input, afraid she might revoke her permission for Christmas to Commence. “My whole family always comes down to my house and my abuela cooks this amazing dinner and we all open one present on Christmas Eve —” Lance had finally cut himself off with a frown. “Actually, Shiro’s probably right. We don’t have time to take a break…” This, obviously, wasn’t true, but the realization that he wouldn’t be able to spend Christmas with his family had hit him hard in the chest. He’d realized that maybe he didn’t _want_  to have Christmas without them. He should’ve gotten rid of his phone when they’d first gone into space — that way he wouldn’t have to know when he was spending his first Christmas away from home.

“No, no, I think _you’re_  right, Lance,” Shiro had hastily cut in. There’d been agreements all around, and just like that Lance had dredged his Christmas spirit back to the forefront. He knew that, had his family known he was out here, they’d be wanting him to have a just as joyous Christmas season as he always did. He only hoped theirs wasn’t too sad, what with his absence and all…

But it was because of this sudden mass of agreement that Lance was here now, digging around in an old storage closet on a lower level of the castle for anything vaguely Christmas-like. There obviously weren’t any Christmas trees around, nor any Santa statues or decorative pillows or string lights. It was becoming glaringly obvious that Lance was going to have to make do.

That was how he ended up commandeering the ship, anyway. He lugged a tree-looking plant from a random planet aboard the ship and into the common room, deeming it Voltron’s Christmas tree. From another planet he found bugs similar to fireflies back on earth, except these ones came in all sorts of colors and occasionally exploded for a reason no one could seem to figure out. Lance managed to get the whole team to capture these bugs in jars — and by that, he meant Allura forced everyone to help him in order to restore Christmas spirit. Jars of these bugs were shoved into the not-Christmas tree to make it glow as well as scattered around various other places of the castle to liven everything up a little.

It was all going fine enough. Christmas was looming over their heads and decorations were growing every day aboard the castleship as Lance somehow managed to dig up more and more items that vaguely resembled Christmas ones. Presents had been purchased (definitely never stolen) at various space malls and had slowly began to grow in amount beneath the not-Christmas tree.

And now, to top everything off perfectly, Lance had found something eerily close to mistletoe.

When Lance said eerily close, he meant that it was a plant. And small. It was hardly worth mentioning that it was bright blue and smelt of fire, because it was _perfect_. So it was this that Lance hung above the doorway to the common room, a triumphant smile plastered to his face.

And, seconds later, it was also because of the clearly-not-mistletoe that he found himself trapped. An invisible wall seemed to have descended on all sides of him, and no amount of banging on it did anything other than make Lance’s hands sore. 

“Help!” he called, hands cupped around his mouth as his heart rate started to pick up in a panic. What if he was trapped in here forever? Oh God, what if he had to pee?! “Allura!” he shouted, getting more desperate. “Shiro! Hunk!”

Lance continued through the small list of people aboard the ship, calling for help over and over again. Surely they would’ve heard him by now? He was screaming as loud as he could manage and yet no one had come running, which didn’t make any sense. Sometimes he could hear Hunk singing as he cooked in the kitchen from his own bedroom, and those two parts of the castle weren’t even that close to each other. Point was — noise echoed in this big, empty spacecraft. It got around.

Eventually, though Lance didn’t like to call it giving up, he sank to the floor, slouching against the invisible wall. He’d grown bored of screaming and shouting. He’d grown even more bored of having to sit here and do nothing — it was practically his worst nightmare come to life.

He didn’t know how much time had passed when Keith turned the corner.

“Keith!” Lance cried out, jumping to his feet in excitement. Keith’s head whipped to the side after this movement and he squinted at Lance. “Keith, thank God you’re here,” Lance began. “I’m trapped in here!”

“Lance… what?” Keith said. He was walking towards him now, continuing to regard him with confusion. 

“What do you mean, ‘what’?” Lance scoffed. “Get Allura! Or Pidge. I just need to get out of here!”

“I can’t hear you,” Keith said, now coming to a stop just before Lance. He leaned even closer, his eyebrows furrowed as he thought.

“Oh, this is bullshit!” said Lance. Keith, who was an idiot, took another step forward.

“What are you saying?”

“I’m _saying_ : get me out of here!” Lance answered, not exactly expecting Keith’s eyes to widen in understanding. “Wait, you can hear me?”

“Yeah, now,” said Keith. “What is this? What’s going on?”

“All right, well. Don’t be alarmed,” Lance started. “But we’re trapped in here?”

“What?” Keith said. Lance, ever the patient and understanding teacher, placed his hands on Keith’s shoulders and shoved. Keith stumbled backwards, bonked into the invisible wall, and ricocheted back towards Lance with an odd sound in the back of his throat. He caught himself on Lance’s arms before quickly letting go and spinning around.

“What the fuck was that?” he said.

Lance shrugged. “A wall?” he guessed. “The invisible kind. We’re trapped.”

“You don’t say.”

“At least we’re trapped together,” said Lance. “I’m sure it’ll be much more entertaining now that I’m not in here alone.” This was the wrongest statement of the century. Keith immediately grew bored of standing and sank to the ground, leaning his head back with a yawn and closing his eyes.

“Awesome,” Lance said, following Keith to the floor with a huff. “Just the kind of company I needed.”

His snark didn’t earn him a response. Keith just continued to sit there, looking all grumpy and Keith like. Possibly a thousand more years passed before Pidge came crossing the far end of the hall, looking determined with her nose buried in an Altean tablet.

Now, Lance didn’t like to brag, but it was probably important to point out that he was, in fact, a genius. Because he figured out that just because he couldn’t get out of the forcefield himself didn't mean that _everything_  couldn’t — i.e., his shoe.

Yes. Yes, Lance took off his shoe and chucked it down the hallway at Pidge. It hit her in the shin and she cursed, nearly dropping her tablet and spinning around abruptly after securing the thing in her hands, looking downright murderous. Lance just smiled sheepishly, waving her over.

“What the hell was that for?” Pidge demanded, marching towards them. Keith had become privy to the conversation, desperate for rescue as well, so he was now standing, waiting as eagerly as Lance was for Pidge to figure this out and set them free.

Lance panicked, thinking Pidge was going to keep walking and get trapped in this little forcefield with them. He frantically waved at her, pressing his hands against the barrier and shaking his head fervently. Luckily, Pidge was a genius prodigy, so she took these signs for what they were and paused a while back, cocking her head.

“You’re stuck in there, aren’t you?” she said. Both Lance and Keith nodded. “And for some reason I can’t hear you?”

“You’ve got that right,” Lance confirmed. Pidge granted them a single, decisive nod.

“Sit tight,” she said. “I’ve gotta go do some research.” With that, she turned around and disappeared, though not without Lance screaming after her, begging her not to go.

“She can’t hear you,” Keith grumbled, leaning back against the wall and crossing his arms — classic Keith pose.

“We’re dead,” Lance said, sniffing as he kicked at the invisible wall. He did this with his socked foot, which really hurt his toes and was a lot less satisfying than he’d wanted it to be. He hissed under his breath and grabbed his foot while hopping on the other. “We’re dying in here!”

“We’re not dying in here,” Keith said.

“What if we have to pee?” Lance fretted.

“Do you?”

“No, but time will tell,” Lance said darkly, and Keith rolled his eyes.

“Pidge’ll figure it out,” he promised. Lance didn’t go about accepting promises from Keith every day of his life, so he debated trying to etch his will into the floor to pass the time. Then again, did you really need a will up here in space? It wasn’t like Lance had much to bequeath to anyone, other than his lion. And well, she wasn’t really his to give, was she? She’d chose him, not the other way around.

And so, again, they waited. Lance just wanted to know what was up with this freaky Altean plant. It was like… the Anti Mistletoe. Instead of being cute and Christmassy and bringing two people together by the pressure of tradition and societal norms, it _trapped_  and _threatened_  and probably _killed_ , knowing Alteans. For all Lance knew he’d been breathing poisoned air this entire time, a secret the Alteans had embedded into their Anti-Mistletoe-enslavement-plant.

Thankfully, Lance didn’t have to ponder on his own for long. He lost his second shoe in an attempt to garner Allura’s attention as she passed by, something which thankfully worked. She took one look from the shoe, to Lance’s silent shouting, and finally to the plant hung above his and Keith’s heads.

“Oh, Lance,” she said solemnly, shaking her head. “Why on Altea have you hung that wretched plant?”

“Wretched plant?” Lance scoffed. “It looks _just like_  mistletoe.”

“No it doesn’t,” Keith argued. “It’s blue!”

“Details,” Lance said flippantly, waving him off. This whole interaction went unheard by Allura, who had stopped a good few feet away from them and placed her hands on her hips.

“I’m afraid you’ve hung up a Puckering Plant,” Allura sighed, and Lance cocked his head to the side. “It’s a —”

Allura was interrupted by the sound of evil laughter echoing from down the hallway — and by evil laughter, Lance meant Pidge. She came barreling into sight, only to be followed by a worried looking Hunk and a confused looking Shiro.

“Oh God,” Keith huffed, and Lance glanced at him curiously. “What’s going on?”

“You guys have _got_  to see this,” Pidge was saying, still laughing, and Lance elected to ignore her. He looked back at Allura, pleading.

“I’m sorry Lance,” she said sadly. “You’ve been trapped by the Puckering Plant. There’s no getting you two out of there until you, well… pucker up.”

And this was how Lance found himself still enslaved by a plant several hours later. And it was _obviously_  Keith’s fault.

“Just kiss him Lance!” Hunk was saying — begging, practically. Keith was standing there with his arms crossed, glaring at Lance like he had any right to. Lance was still squished into the corner that he’d flung himself into the second Allura had first uttered the words “pucker up”. He couldn’t _kiss_  Keith! He just… couldn’t — not for any specific reason or anything!

“Yeah Lance, it’s not a big deal,” Keith said. When Allura had first told them to kiss, Keith had rolled his eyes and turned to face Lance, looking ready to actually _do_  it. Then he’d seen Lance, having shoved himself into the invisible corner, and had pulled similarly invisible shutters down behind his eyes, blocking any and every emotion from being seen through them.

“Psh!” Lance said, scoffing for good measure. “Keith, I know it’s not a big deal. I’m doing this for you.” This received a series of blank stares.

“What?” Keith finally managed.

“It’s okay Keith — I know.”

“ _What_?”

“I know that you’ve totally never kissed anyone, and I know that you don’t want to waste it right now on me, _so_ , it’s okay. Pidge’ll figure out how to get us out of here eventually.”

“No I won’t.” Pidge was sitting on the floor. At some point she’d procured a bowl of popcorn, though Lance had no idea when.

“I’ve been kissed before,” Keith said, and Lance gaped at him: full on open mouth and wide eyes.

“You’ve what now?”

Keith just shrugged. “It’s not a big deal.”

“Well, yeah, duh,” Lance hastily agreed. “ _I_  know it’s not a big deal.”

“So you agree.” It wasn’t a question.

“Totally.”

“And since it’s not a big deal, we can just kiss and get the hell out of here?”

Lance felt his lips lock together, his entire body trying to escape through the invisible corner, which was still, sadly, very solid.

Okay, okay, _fine_ : confession time. Lance, maybe, possibly, by _happenstance_ , had never kissed anyone before. _Maybe_. And, since he’d maybe never kissed anyone before, well… he didn’t want to be forced into it, okay!? It was supposed to be magical and romantic and — and — not like this!

It wasn’t supposed to be in front of an audience. It _especially_  wasn’t supposed to be with the sound of Pidge crunching on popcorn as background noise. And okay, yeah, Lance’ll admit it: it wasn’t supposed to be with Keith either. 

He knew that no good could come of having feelings for the people he was forced to interact with on a daily basis. If anything were ever to happen between him and whoever he may or may not possibly have feelings for, then it could also _end_ , and with an end to a relationship came a beginning to a whole lot of tension and awkwardness, and Lance wasn’t up for that, thank you very much. So, no, Lance didn’t want to kiss Keith. He wanted to save his first kiss for the way it was supposed to be.

“Maybe we can eat the plant,” Lance suggested. “Can it really work its magic if we’re _digesting_  it? Hmm?”

“Lance, that’s the worst idea you’ve ever had,” Allura said.

“Strong statement, Allura,” said Lance. “Considering the amount of ideas I come up with without bothering to put any thought into them first.”

“That’s true,” Hunk conceded, and Lance shot him a pair of finger guns, what a man.

“Awesome,” said Lance. “I’m gonna eat this plant then. Keith? Boost me up?”

Keith just rolled his eyes, his arms still crossed, and Lance sighed, letting himself fall back into the invisible barrier dramatically. “Is there really no other way out of this Allura?” he said. Allura nodded.

“It’s the only way, Lance,” she said.

“Fine.” Lance looked at Keith, chewing on his own cheek. “Well?” he prompted.

Keith huffed, visibly annoyed, and he stepped forward and leaned in. It was fast, and sudden, and his lips were soft and his breath was warm and his hand, resting on Lance’s elbow for barely a second, was _hot_. And then he was pulling away and his eyes were like ice, glaring daggers at Lance before he spun and marched down the hall.

“Looks like it worked,” said Shiro, looking after Keith. Lance, too, was looking after Keith. And though he didn’t notice it, his fingers were touching his lips, chasing the feeling of Keith’s mouth against his.

—

Lance had fucked up. Like… he’d big time fucked up. The kind of fucked up where everyone was sending him pitying looks because _they_  knew he’d fucked up too. And Keith was a whole other story — he’d become Mr. Disappearing Act. Lance hadn’t seen anything but glimpses of him since the whole kiss situation had happened! Which was also Lance’s fault.

He knew he had to do something to fix this. Looking back on it now, he’d been more than just selfish, standing under that not-mistletoe — he’d been _mean_. Because how would he have felt if it’d been Keith refusing to kiss him for _hours_? God, Lance had thought that whole, dramatic, kiss-me-not thing through so poorly that now the entire team was pitying him for it. Except for Keith. He just seemed angry.

And so yes, obviously, Lance had to fix this. He had to take matters into his own hands, meaning he had to barge into Keith’s room and force him to listen to his apology.

The only problem with this plan was the fact that each time Lance burst into Keith’s room, his speech written on his hand in case he forgot the words he’d meticulously memorized, Keith wasn’t there. This would lead to Lance searching the whole castle for him, but Keith was like a ghost, nowhere to be found.

Eventually, Lance had to take drastic measures. While he was digging through the storage room again, he briefly thought to himself, _should I think this through a bit more before I hang up a second not-mistletoe and get myself stuck under it?_ , but just as quickly decided, _nah_. This was an ingenious idea, he was sure of it.

Anyway, this was how he found himself stuck under the not-mistletoe once more. After they’d been freed the first time, Allura had disposed of the plant, warning Lance to not go hanging up any other Christmas decorations without first asking her or Coran if they dangerous. Technically though, Lance wasn’t breaking any rules by doing this. He already _knew_  this plant was dangerous, so.

Although honestly, having been trapped under this exact plant before, Lance probably should’ve thought to bring something to do. He’d forgotten how bored he’d been under here the first time, and it was with a resigned sigh that he realized he was going to have to wait. _Again_.

Unfortunately, the first person to find him wasn’t Keith.

“ _Lance_?” Hunk said incredulously, rushing towards the end of the hallway. “How’d you get trapped again?!” Lance just shook his head frantically, gesturing for Hunk to stop. Thankfully, he did.

“Someone’s going to have to get in there with you, Lance,” he warned. “You have to kiss someone to get out, remember?”  


Lance nodded. “Get Keith,” he instructed.

“What?” said Hunk.

" _Keith_ ,” Lance repeated. He tried to imitate having a mullet to further explain himself, but it didn’t really work, so he just settled for saying it again. “KEITH!”

“Keith?” Hunk questioned, and Lance whooped, jumping up and down in excitement. “You want me to get him?” Hunk concluded. Lance gave him a big ol’ thumbs up, and Hunk turned away, looking beyond confused.

It took _forever_  for Keith to show up, which Lance realized was probably understandable. He had no idea how Hunk had even managed to find him in the first place.

“Are you kidding me, Lance?” Keith snapped, pausing outside the barrier with his arms crossed. Lance gestured him forward desperately. “What, so I can be stuck in there for hours while you panic over kissing me again? No thanks.” With that, Keith spun on the spot and began marching away. Lance, thinking fast, threw his shoe at him.

Keith spun back around with a growl. Lance put his hands before his face in a perfect imitation of the praying emoji, pleading with him. Finally, Keith kicked Lance’s shoe angrily and stomped into the trap, possibly because he was weak-willed, or possibly because he loved the idea of kissing Lance again.

“Let’s get this over with,” he spat.

“Wait!” 

“Are you joking?”

“I just wanted to apologize.” This made Keith rear back in surprise, blinking. “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings, I just… That’s not how I wanted my first kiss to be.”

“Your first kiss?”

“I mean, _who’s to say_  —”

“That was your first kiss?” Keith said, interrupting him, and Lance deflated.

“ _Yes_ , okay? I’m sorry! I wasn’t trying to be a dick, I just —”

Keith held up a finger, and Lance shut up appropriately. “You’re telling me you got yourself stuck in here again to explain that to me?” he questioned. “You do realize you’re going to have to kiss me again, right?”

Lance just shrugged. “I figured this time I’d be prepared.” Wrongest statement of the century: the sequel.

Keith reached out and yanked Lance into him, into a kiss, and Lance made some sort of surprised sound that was swallowed in the kiss. He didn’t like to admit it, but he _melted_  against Keith, long limbs all buttery and soft as he forgot how to stand, gripping onto Keith like a lifeline.

Lance had dreamed of kissing for practically his whole life. He’d imagined it in about a million different scenarios with about a million different people, and still he’d never imagined it to be as good as this.

By the time Keith pulled away, Lance was panting and his eyes were wide. “Um,” he said intelligently, and Keith laughed, resting his head on Lance’s shoulder. “Keith?”

“Yeah?”

“You wanna keep kissing me somewhere else?”

Keith just laughed again, but you can take Lance’s word for it: it was a very merry Christmas indeed.


End file.
